Some of the Impacts of Political Polarization
A brief case study of the United States
Some of us, including the author, live in a multiparty society. In my case, it is Canada, my adopted country. The United States (US), my birth country, never successfully formed a lasting multiparty system. The politics in the US have been dominated by two parties since the mid-19th century: the Democrats formed in 1828 and the Republicans in 1854. This article will attempt to demonstrate how the near 50:50 split of potential voters between the Democrats and Republicans has a high degree of uncertainty built into the system, e.g. no different from a simple coin toss.
There is estimated to be five categories of governments worldwide
There exist many forms of government worldwide. A summery of 255 governments, among five categories, is shown here.
A majority of countries (~55%) support multi-party governments (Canada has five parties with Members in Parliament). Only 11% of the 255 countries have only two. The United States is by far the most influential in that category.
In the early days of the US Federal campaign there are three “Unofficial parties”.
The co-called Independents (undecided) currently compose ~50% of the potential electorate. Within that undecided population there is a 50:50 split of “Leaners” toward each of the two parties; whether or not they maintain their current choices is the essence of the issue. Between January 2024 and November 5, 2024, the Leaners will be courted to move from the undecided to become committed to one of the two parties. The transition from 50% undecided to solid votes for one of the two parties will require on average a 4% monthly gain, or loss, for each of the two parties between January and November. In the 2020 Presidential election, there were ~80 million ballots cast by Independents( Leaners): approximately 50% of the total ballots cast.
Consequences of a two-party system
Politics have a lot of built-in uncertainty, regardless the jurisdiction. There is a huge amount of money spent on gathering information and catering to the electorate. One of the more prominent pollsters in the US is Gallup. Results of twenty three Gallup polls over the past 12 months are summarised in this table. Here’s the crux of the information: just replace “Independents” with “Uncertain” and you will understand the essence of the coming open competition for Independents in the 2024 Presidential campaigns: it’s 50:50, like a coin toss.
The data above can be misleading. The reason being that the media will concentrate on the proportions claiming to be Democrats or Republicans, the Independents cannot be counted on until further along in the campaign. Therefore, the Gallup data might be reported by the media to be ~50:50, i.e. 0.24/(0.24+0.26)= 0.48 Democrats and 0.52 Republicans. Regardless, the Independents hold the capacity to decide the winner.
Here’s how the “Leaners” are distributed in the Gallup poll since January 2023
This is likley the situation going into January 2024 when the campaign will accelerate. Statistically, this summary shows that the Independents are split 50:50, with a very small “lean” in favour of the Republicans.
The numbers hold the evidence for the uncertainty in the 2-party system
When the proportion of voters for either party are equal, the “uncertainty” is maximized, i.e. potentially 50% of the voters may wait until election day to make a final choice. If the votes are driven in either direction from that maximum uncertainty (below) 50:50, the system becomes more predictable. Whenever a single party gains a solid majority, the number of Independents goes down and the “uncertainty” in the outcome of the election is reduced.
In a two party system there is not a clear path to form a coalition government (per Canada and other counties) where one or more minority parties might hold the balance of power. If there were to be, in good faith, bipartisan negotiations in the US Congress, a semblance of an ad hoc coalition might emerge in the US.
To win, the two major parties must concentrate on absorbing the Independents (Leaners)
The graph below displays an example of how the transition might proceed over the campaign during the coming 2024 election year. The nonlinear rate of change is ~4 % per month, plus or minus undefined variation in the percentages each month. This analysis is modeled after what would be expected in a gain or loss function of an asset. In this case, that asset being voter turnout, AKA votes received.
The transition during 2024
Hopefully, by now, you have a better appreciation for the US voter conundrum. The author has intentionally not introduced the US “Electoral College”, the final decider of a US election. Have a look here for some of the pros and cons of the EC:https://www.monmouth.edu/magazine/the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly-about-the-electoral-college/ . Finally, additional uncertainty is added to each election because the US lacks consistent, national rules and guidelines for how an election is conducted. That is because each state has its own set of procedures making it impossible to statistically evaluate among jurisdictions.
Publicly available data were accessed to prepare this article.
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Happy New Year!
Zack Florence
